Karma - the sequel to Moving On. If you haven't already read Moving On then I'd strongly suggest you read it first, or this'll confuse the hell out of you!

DISCLAIMER: Any characters you recognize from the original film are the sole property of Universal Pictures – everyone else is mine. Any copyright infringement is unintended.

A/N - I wasn't originally going to write a sequel to Moving On but so many people asked for one that I found myself right back in the middle of Chloe/Vince, Brian/Katy and Le/Samantha. I'd like to say thank you to my very favourite Australian girl - she knows who she is and she knows how much she means to me. Keep sending me the music sweetie, you've no idea how much it inspires me.

Chapter 1

Chloe was fed up – fat, tired and fed up. It had been weeks since she'd been able to sleep for more than 3 hours without having to get up and go to the bathroom and she couldn't remember the last time she'd seen her feet. Being pregnant in LA really wasn't much fun – it was far too muggy and she was surrounded by far too many thin women. By far the worst thing was that she had another 7 weeks to go, another 7 weeks to keep getting bigger and bigger. She was already the size of a house and she dreaded to think what size she'd be when the baby arrived. To start with she'd been lulled into a false sense of security that maybe the baby would take after her build wise and not Vince; that thought had soon been blown out of the water once she'd told V she was pregnant. It was almost as if the baby realised it didn't have to hide anymore and she'd gone from a slight bump to obviously pregnant pretty much over night.

'Not that it bothers Vince' she thought as she carefully made her way down the stairs. He was fascinated with her ever growing bump and was constantly telling her how beautiful she was and how proud he was that she was having his baby. There had been many girls over the years who'd claimed that they were expecting his child but each and every one of them had been lying. He'd never slept with any of them without using a condom, he never knew just where they'd been before they ended up in his bed, but he could count on 1 hand how many times he and Chloe had been organized enough to have condoms available when they'd made love.

As Chloe headed into the kitchen to get yet more ice cubes to eat she saw Le's keys on the counter and the back door flapping in the gentle breeze. It was only 2am, far too early for Le to be home from his date with Samantha and judging by the way he was standing staring out to sea something was wrong. For the 1st time in a long time Chloe didn't know what to do, Le had been pulling away from her since he'd found out she was pregnant and she didn't feel entirely comfortable going out to see what was wrong. She couldn't put her finger on exactly when things had started to change between them, but change they had. Part of her wondered if someone had said something to him about the amount of time they spent together but she knew that V never would and she was pretty certain that Samantha wouldn't either. Everyone who knew them knew that there was nothing more than friendship between them but she couldn't help but wonder if maybe, just maybe someone had told him it looked like something more.

Chloe was still torn between leaving Le alone and going out to see if she could help when she saw the torn up remains of a photo on the floor by the bin. It was obvious that someone had been aiming at the bin but hadn't quite managed to get everything in. Taking a deep breath she slowly got down onto her hands and knees to retrieve the bits from the bin and the floor. As she pieced the photo together she realised it was one that she'd taken just a couple of weeks before, that had been the last time that she's seen Le looking truly happy – he and Samantha had been sharing a sun bed by the pool and Chloe had taken the photo without either of them realising. Once she'd printed it off she'd given a copy to Le and he'd carefully torn it down to size to fit in his wallet. It was then that Chloe realised that whatever had happened to upset Le was serious, he'd vowed then never to take the picture out of his wallet – he loved Samantha and he was never letting her go.

Chloe cursed every god known to man as she struggled to her feet, she loved being pregnant she really did, but she was so restricted in what she could do now that she couldn't wait for it to be over. She'd dropped a pen on the floor of the office the other week and it had taken her nearly 15 minutes to get back up.

Taking one last look at the desolate figure in front of her she slowly made her way over the sand, desperately hoping that Le wouldn't turn her away. She'd not seen him so miserable in a long time and it went against everything she believed in to leave him alone in such pain.

Le was aware of Chloe standing next to him long before she spoke, he'd been trying to find the right words to apologise to her for his recent behaviour but he just hadn't known where to start. Chloe and V were his family yet he'd virtually ignored them since that night at the races, when Chloe had said she was pregnant. Le had been so happy but gradually things had changed, or rather someone had changed and not for the better.

"Do you want to sit down?" Chloe had only seen Le looking like this once before and then it'd taken him a good hour to tell her what was wrong, and there was no way she was standing on the beach for the next hour waiting for him to find the words to tell her what was bothering him.

After Le had helped Chloe sit down he sat behind her, pulling her into his chest and wrapping his arms around her for warmth. It had been a long time since he'd sat just holding someone for comfort and he'd really missed it. He and Chloe had always been affectionate with each other and she'd always known when a cuddle was needed or when a simple smile would be enough but they'd grown apart these past few months. Well, that wasn't exactly true – he'd pulled away from her and sitting there now holding her, he regretted every moment of the previous few months.

"What's wrong Le? What's happened?" Chloe knew better than to push Le when he got like this but she also knew that if she didn't get him to talk to her soon she was going to fall asleep and then nothing would get sorted out. The warmth of his hard body behind her and the small circles his fingers were drawing on her stomach weren't just soothing the baby, she could feel her own eyelids growing heavier and she couldn't help herself from snuggling just that little bit further into his arms as the welcoming darkness approached.

"I'm sorry Chloe, I…." Le felt the words stick in his throat as he tried to explain to Chloe what had been happening between them.

"What did I do Le? I keep going over it in my mind but I've no idea what I did to push you away. You're my best friend Le, I miss you." Chloe had barely finished speaking when she started crying – her relationship with Le had completely fallen apart and she had no idea where to start putting it right, or even if it could be put right again. It used to be that she could talk to him about anything but these days she was lucky if he said anything other than good morning and good night. It had broken her heart when he'd just glanced at her sonogram picture and hadn't congratulated her and V on the news their first born child would be a boy.

"Oh Chloe, no, it's not you." If there had been a gun in easy reach Le would have happily killed himself at that moment, he loved Chloe more than anyone but he'd not only made her cry, he'd made her think all their problems were her fault. Chloe had obviously kept all her fears to herself, if she'd told V he'd have been in serious pain within minutes and he doubted that Brian's reaction would have been any less painful. The only person she could have spoken to was Samantha and somehow he doubted she would have done anything to ease her fears. Since Katy had started working as a lifeguard she'd hardly been around. If she wasn't on the beach saving lives she was at college continuing her studies or she was with Brian, continuing her studies in a whole different subject! Chloe had had some problems with high blood pressure which had left her confined to bed for nearly 4 weeks and apart from V she'd pretty much been left alone.

"I didn't want to bother you; you had enough on your plate without adding my problems as well." Le had more than just screwed up this time, he'd completely fucked things up and he had no idea where they could go from here.

For nearly 2 hours Le poured his heart out to Chloe, told her what had been happening and why he'd pulled away from her. It wasn't that he didn't love her anymore or didn't want to be her friend, it was simply that he'd been 'advised' to keep away from her – keep his own problems to himself to save Chloe from the added stress. He'd tried still being her friend and hiding his pain but Chloe had a way of looking straight through him, she always knew when he was suffering and she couldn't just sit by and do nothing. He'd decided it was easier to just keep away than constantly lie to her and upset her even more. What he hadn't counted on was the effects his cutting her from his life would have on her. He'd never seen Chloe so upset, not even when she thought V was leaving her and it killed him to know that he was the cause of her pain. She'd always thought that V would leave her once he was recovered but she'd never, ever thought that Le would hurt her like that. Relationships break down but friendships are supposed to last a lifetime.

By the time Le had finished explaining everything to Chloe he felt a thousand times better but Chloe was still confused. She had no idea who'd been filling Le's head with such stupid ideas and she still didn't know what had happened to make him angry enough to rip up the photo of him and Samantha.

"I saw the photo Le." Leon's hands froze on Chloe's stomach when she spoke. He'd been trying to forget what he'd seen at Samantha's house that had sent him into such a rage that he'd virtually trashed the garage and had torn up everything of hers that he could lay his hands on. The photo in his wallet had been the last thing to connect them and he'd not been able bear the thought of having her so close to him.

"What happened, Le? I thought you two were happy together." Chloe just couldn't understand what had gone wrong between Le and Samantha. Whenever she'd seen them he'd always been happy and smiling and when Samantha had come and seen Chloe when she was confined to bed she'd spent ages telling her how she'd helped Le put all his demons behind him and how they had the perfect relationship.

Le swallowed thickly and he struggled to find the words to tell Chloe just what had gone wrong between him and Samantha. Truth be known he didn't really know when things had started to go wrong; all he knew was that they were finished and if he never spoke to her again it would be too soon.

"I got to the house early today, I wanted to surprise her."

Chloe felt the tears rise in her throat as Le started to explain what had happened, it was all too familiar to her – she could only pray that what had happened to her hadn't happened to Le.

"She was in the shower, getting ready she said." Le scoffed at the memory of Samantha smiling at him from around the shower curtain, "She'd been busy painting and wanted to get cleaned up before we went out."

Chloe could feel Le's hands starting to shake as he carried on speaking and the nausea she felt at the memory of her husband and her sister was replaced with an overwhelming anger. Pregnant or not, the next time she saw Samantha she'd batter her – Le loved her and had never been anything but loyal to her.

"I found this in the bed," as he was speaking Le reached into his jeans pocket and pulled out a heavy platinum cross on a long chain. It obviously belonged to a man and Chloe had never seen Le wear anything other than his heavy link chain.

"It's not mine and the bed was still warm."